Welcome to "Dust, Tears & Dice", a blog dedicated to the hobby of miniature wargaming.
If you fancy gaming periods off the beaten track then this is the place for you.
I am a regular member of The Wyvern Wargamers, formerly The Evesham Wargames Club drawing gamers from Worcester, Redditch, Kidderminster, Cheltenham and Stratford.
All players welcome.

Sunday, June 26, 2016

Last Sunday saw the forth outing in the Wyvern Wargamers Starship
Troopers Campaign the beauty of this type of game is that it can be boxed away and reappear based on the players available and new players can be dropped in as they appear at the club such as this week with the appearance of Henriks Heroes.

Scenario.

Not long after military forces from Earth think they've defeated an alien Bug infestation on Pluto, the insects return and threaten our
scientific outposts. Mobile Infantry forces are sent back to Pluto for
what is believed to be a little mop-up mission. Henrik's Heroes, Baldwins B*stards and Wyvern Warriors soon discover that this is not just a simple "hit and run" mission ... but the
first battle of what's to become the First Interstellar War.

Sunday nights objective - Protect the O2 Purification plant or worse case extract the technical crew if the bug activity is to hot.

Northing but dirt and rock as far as the eye can see at the far end of the table the O2 plant can been seen, sensors are on but nothing appears to be moving out there.

The O2 plant, Henrik's Heroes are given the honour of defending the plant, with a healthy 500 points to spend, he must await the rescue part of Baldwin's B*stards and the Wyvern Warriors.

Techies run for cover as the alarm sounds - "Bugs....."

Baldwins B*stards the most numerous of units, two squads of Mobile Infantry and a newly acquired CHAS with it's two chain guns.

HH have chosen wisely with two Mobile Infantry squads and a couple of armoured pill boxes to keep the Bugs at bay, things get stickly straight away as a big hole opens up a few meters from the defence line.

The mobile Infantry dig in and pour fire into the advancing bugs but dispite taking casualties the bugs close with the infantry and half a squad are ripped apart as their comrades in the pill box look on in horror..... Welcome to the Bug Wars HH.

Meanwhile as the relief column march towards the O2 Plant, flyers zip in heading straight for the Wyverns a squad of fresh recruits.

Back at the O2 plant things are getting rather sticky, hordes of bugs are crest the high ground and head straight for the defenders, Cliff mites crawl from the rock faces and scammper for the defenders who are left with no option but to fire at everything with more than two legs.

The column is making slow progress, with a number of fresh recruits carried off, but help is coming in the shape of the CHAS who has reached the high ground.

The Bugs close in for the kill but a string of poor command rolls and concentrated fire leaves them so close to their human prey, no telling blow.

Finally they reach the Mobile Infantry lines but struggle to breach the pill box and it's armoured shell, as razor sharp claws puncher the roof, the infantry continue to fire, chopping down a number of bugs and slowing their advance.

Back at the column a horde of bugs pour of the ridge line, but BB is awaiting supporting by the CHAS unit, who takes chunks out of the charging bugs wiping out whole units in a single round.

A view from on high, WW fight for their lives against the fliers, whilst the Infantry and CHAS Units beat off wave after wave of bugs.

To little to late, the bugs send in a Tanker to strike the final blow, but with the clock ticking down the game draws to a close with a victory for mankind.

The toll on the defenders had been high with several killed and wounded, but Henrik's Heroes held the O2 plant. The Wyverns had been mauled but had beaten off the Fliers, meanwhile Baldwin's B*stards had once again come out on top, not losing a single man and destroying numerous bug units.... With a little help from CHAS and Dave his handler :-)

They will certainly take some catching on the leader board.

Another fun outing, the Swatter Rules worked really well with mulitple players and everyone was kept active, the bugs were lethal if they got in but were vunerable to the mass fire of the CHAS unit.

Tune in next time as the settlement of New Disney stands in the way of the Bug horde, will Victory once again come to the Mobile Infantry.

Friday, June 10, 2016

A few months back a picked up a set of the Swatter Rules, but never quite found the time to give them a run out.

I like the mechanisms for the the Songs of Blades rules and Swatter is no different. Each unit has a
Quality Rating and a Combat Rating with fire fights and Hand to Hand conducted on an opposed D6 dice roll.

Swatter is slightly different moving figures on CD's in effect squad fire, with the added mix of a pool of command dice which each side can draw upon to add to to your combat or shooting results or to generate reinforcements if
you are the bugs..

So time to give them a proper run out, before next weeks club game.

A simple scenario the Human forces must cross the table with the majority of their forces intact to win the game, the bugs must stop them.

A short walk in the desert what could go wrong?

After a couple of moves both of us got a grasp of the rules finer details, the Marines going on over watch mindful of the advancing bugs and various bug holes.

Sweeping right the Recon section run into Two bug units. Stopping to read the rules in detail as the first round of fire made no impact, the second attempt when you have the bug numbers and concentrated fire cuts the bugs down before they can close.

You need to be massed if you are bugs so I unleash the Tanker which clustering my remaining forces, trying to tempt the troopers to make a false move.

At the foot of a small rise the marines wait each side looking for the other to fail a quality test.

The Marines crest the hill and pour fire into the bugs below.

He's a big bugger - but nothing that several hundred rounds from the Moria Assault Rifle can't fix.

With the tanker down, the victorious humans clear the table, having lost 3 of their number to over 50 bugs. Touch and go in parts but concentrated fire control wins the day.

Plenty to learn for next weeks game.

The movement by CD is not needed so I am thinking of switching to a short stick for command range. Thus allowing the humans to cluster more figures together if required. but also allowing individuals to fire into bug groups, but risking the loss of initiative.

The cost of the bugs needs to be reduced and perhaps allowing them to move in larger herds instead of groups of 5 as the initiative rolls on a 3 makes it hard to keep a significant number moving.

All in all a satisfying first outing and nice to get the toys back on the table.

Tuesday, June 07, 2016

With the Russian upgrades barely varnished and in their cases, I was thinking about how they might get some extra game time and who might their opponents be?

Then spotted these figures from Rebel Mini's in the US.

One can't help but think about the RoboCop reboot from 2014.

Not quite up to the original in the 80's - "I work for Dick Jones". But the EM 208 Omnicorp Drones looked pretty cool.

With a slowly growing urban building collection and don't forget a bunch of cars. Why not keep it in the same kind of theatre and as luck would have it stumbled into this on the sky box office the other evening.

Not exactly oscar material but I am a sucker for an all action guns blazing science fiction war film. The film is set in modern-day Los Angeles and follows Aaron Eckhart perhaps best known for playing Harvey Dent in Batman as a retiring Marine Staff Sergeant slapping on his helmet to lead a platoon of Green U.S. Marines, during an alien invasion.

Surely the nasty aliens don't always land in the US first?
So what's good for Los Angeles is good for any City in the world?
Why not any former eastern block city, say Grozny?
Ok no palm trees.

Before you know it, I had clicked purchase and am know waiting for the postman to deliver me a bunch of Alien Invaders.

Sunday, June 05, 2016

So the curtain comes down on another Market Larden event and this one was perhaps the best yet. As ever the atmosphere was great and so different to many events in the gaming calander, a room full of people looking to playout a well balanced scenario on wonderful terrain, not a super pointed army designed to win the game at all costs in sight.

Housed in the Wyverns Club House and organised by Ade Deacon, OML is fast becoming the go to Lardy event of the year.

9.37am and we are off.

Over the day over 10 games were put on, here is a seclection of just a few of them.

Mr Avery's IABSM in 15mm

Fellow club member Ian's excellent SCW game, I was fortunate to play this on the afternoon a very bloody affair with both of us down to a couple of Force Morale points, as the clock ran down as I was unable to force my way through the road block at Villianueva de la Canada, the church was to change hands on 4 occasions and as for that flaming Armoured car why I did not ram it in the first place?

Jim Ibbotson's fantastic looking ACW game, a victory for either side.

Mike Hobb's War of 1812 game for Sharp Practice.

Al and Ade's Ardennes 44 - Chain of Command Game. It makes you feel cold just looking at it, a real thing of beauty.

Neil Shuck's - V for Victory"

My morning was filled with a trip to the Caribbean and Nick Skinners fantastic Sharp Practice Game. A simple affair protect plantation over from the rebellious slaves and stay alive until the Marines can arrive.

John from Oxford played the rebel's having spent all night drinking in the barn his men burst out looking for a fight and with a large slice of luck pulled Blue chit after Blue chit and was soon on the masters house, flaming torches in hand. Leaving me no choice but to leave by the front door as they broke in the back.

Stepping out my Marines rush towards the fighting closely followed by the naval detachment.

However Cassius the rebel leader was not put off by the men in red and filled the fields with musket armed rebels.

Cassius and Dr Love. "He get's knocked down but gets up again"

Finally some order is brought to the proceedings with good old British diplomacy - In short a crashing volley and the bayonet.

With only 6 losses for the Crown it looked easier than it was, the rebels were fast moving and everytime the volley was set would move off out of arc, whilst the attackers were defeated I am sorry to say the plantation house was razed to the ground and Mrs Roundwood was killed by a musket ball from the attackers. That will make for terrible reading in the London press.

Thanks to Nick for running proceedings and for John being a good sport.